"A forgery. But I felt for the poor young beggar, and didn't want to be hard on him; so I pretended to Bellamy that I'd made a mistake and meant somebody else, and explained that I'd been at the champagne rather freely the other night; and—you know Bellamy—he was satisfied."
"Well?" said Jasper, in a low voice.
"Well, then I took a cab, and drove to 22 Percival street——"
He paused abruptly, and bit his lip; but Jasper, though he heard the address, and had stamped it, as it were, on his memory, showed no sign of having noticed it, and examined his nails curiously.
"I drove to the young fellow's rooms, and he confessed to it. Poor young beggar! I pitied him from the bottom of my heart—I did indeed. Wrong, I know. Justice, and example, and all that, you'll say; but if you'd seen him, with his head buried in his hands, and his whole frame shaking like a leaf, why, you'd have pitied him yourself."
Jasper put up his hand to his mouth to hide a sneer.
"Very likely," he said—"most likely. I have a particularly soft heart for—forgers."
The captain started slightly. It was a horrible word!
"I don't believe the young beggar meant it, not in cold blood, you know; but he was so knocked of a heap by my dropping down upon him, and so afraid of looking like a welsher that the idea of the bill struck him, and he did it. He swears that Bellamy and he are such chums, that Bellamy wouldn't have minded."
"Ah," said Jasper, with a smile, "the judge and jury will look at that in a different light."